Polari returns to The Printworks for Hastings Book Festival.
Hosted by Paul Burston, with local authors Chris Bridges and Patrick Kealey, and visiting authors Jane Cholmeley and Eleanor Medhurst .
Bookstall kindly provided by Printed Matter.
“Always fun, always thought-provoking, a guaranteed great night out!” - Sarah Waters
7pm doors for 7.30pm start. There is a bar service available at this event.
£8 (£6 conc) in advance, £10 (£8) on the door
About Polari -
Founded in 2007 by author and activist Paul Burston, Polari is a live showcase for emerging and established LGBTQ literary talent.
Described by The Huffington Post as “the most exciting literary movement in London”, the salon also runs the Polari Prize book awards for LGBTQ writing, established in 2011.
This year there are two awards - for a debut book and for a book by an established writer.
The awards are sponsored by FMcM Associates and DHH Literary Agency. The headline sponsor is easyJet Holidays.
Tonight's event is part of The Polari Prize 15th Birthday Showcase, funded by Arts Council England.
For more info please visit www.polarisalon.com
About the lineup -
Chris Bridges is an alumnus of the 2022 London Writers Award. He previously wrote a weekly column for an LGBTQ+ lifestyle website and was a theatre reviewer for various sites. As a former NHS nurse with a hidden disability, he likes to feature the untold stories of sick, dying, and disabled people in his work and smash the trope of the passive disabled character with a background role.
His debut psychological thriller Sick to Death came out in March 2025 and he was shortlisted for the McDermid Award for best debut crime novel.
When not writing, he can be found reading compulsively or walking his uptight poodle, Frida Kahlo.
Jane Cholmeley is the author of A Bookshop of One's Own. Shortlisted for the Indie Book Awards, Christopher Bland Prize and The People's Book Prize, this memoir is her personal account of how a group of women set out to change the world by opening Silver Moon – a feminist bookshop founded in Thatcher’s Britain. Named a Waterstones Best Memoir of 2024, and an Independent and Stylist Best Non-Fiction Book, it is also long-listed for The Polari First Book Prize 2025.
Patrick Kealey has worked as an actor and theatre director, producer, drama lecturer, workshop leader and playwright. His theatre work has taken him to America, France, Eastern Europe, Scandinavia and Colombia, as well as theatres and festivals throughout the UK and Ireland. He performs two solo shows, including the award-winning adaptation of The Life and Times of Archy and Mehitabel.
Patrick also worked as a tour guide all around Ireland for over twenty years and, somewhere along those winding Irish roads, his gay coming of age story Bogboy was born. This is a true story in everything but the detail.
Eleanor Medhurst is a queer historian and the author of Unsuitable: A History of Lesbian Fashion, which is long-listed for The Polari First Book Prize 2025. She studied design and fashion history at the University of Brighton, and has worked towards the sharing of queer histories through her involvement with Queer Looks and Queer the Pier, exhibitions at Brighton Museum.
She shares her research online on TikTok (@elliemedhurst) and Instagram (@dressingdykes).